


A Little Misadventure to the Edge of Falling in Love

by ReminiscentLullaby



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Akuma Attack, Attempt at Humor, F/M, GabeNath Covert Cupid, Gabriel Agreste Is A Dumb Bitch, Pining, Sentimonster (Miraculous Ladybug), This isn't crack but it sure is stupid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-18 18:20:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29247915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReminiscentLullaby/pseuds/ReminiscentLullaby
Summary: "And that’s how Gabriel Agreste wound up face-to-face with Mayura, surrounded by fifty unsuspecting Parisians, caught alive in one of the ugliest pieces of clothing he’s ever seen."
Relationships: Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth/Nathalie Sancoeur
Comments: 10
Kudos: 46
Collections: GabeNath Covert Cupid 2021





	A Little Misadventure to the Edge of Falling in Love

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Starry_Sky12](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starry_Sky12/gifts).



> This was written for the GabeNath Covert Cupid Exchange. This one was definitely a step outside of my comfort zone, but it was a blast to write! Hope you all enjoy!

Gabriel lays motionless on the ground, too shocked to move, too stupid to say anything that makes the slightest bit of sense. 

This most definitely was not the plan. 

Elapsing at an indeterminate speed is a period of time of an equally indeterminate length where Gabriel’s mind goes blank. Flat and empty. His mouth falls open. Some kind of noise – a choked gasp, halfway forming a word that may or may not be “Shit” – escapes. And then he is utterly silent. Silent and rigid like a brick. His heart plummets into the depths of dread. Truth is, he’s been in worse situations before, certainly, but for this stretch (or this halt) of time, relativity does not matter. 

Nathalie has always been better at preparing for every possible scenario. She probably could have seen this coming in at least one of the tracks her mind had taken to ready herself for today. Gabriel watches the last several minutes flash before his eyes in retrospect, wondering what it must have been like for her to see it all before it happened, to dismiss it in good faith that her partner wouldn’t be _that_ foolish and inept to wind up in the exact situation she imagined. _This_ one, out of all of them. 

The one where Ladybug and Chat Noir managed to defeat his akuma almost embarrassingly fast, before they’d even planned to unleash the sentimonster to necessitate the recruitment of a new ally. They’d already gotten their hands on the dog miraculous last week. Their method had worked the first time. Ideally, when Ladybug swooped off to assign a new miraculous to a new random citizen, Hawk Moth and Mayura would also have the chance to corner Chat themselves, overwhelm him with the aid of their creations and take the cat miraculous as well. 

But no. Hawk Moth’s akuma was a goner six minutes into battle, and from where the pair of villains stood watching it from the top of the Arc de Triomphe, it was clear Mayura didn’t have much time to create her sentimonster before the heroes were on them. They clashed with Hawk Moth first. 

“Go!” he called to Mayura, waving her off with the thrust of his left arm as the right blocked a kick to the jaw from the cat. She’d need the space to amokatize herself without getting caught by the string of Ladybug’s yo-yo, and Hawk Moth was perfectly capable of fending off the children on his own for as long. 

He thought he’d buy Mayura some time as well as some distance. If she could control her sentimonster undisturbed, then surely, they would have no issue taking these pesky teenagers down once and for all. He led the fight in the opposite direction she had disappeared to, dodging blows with little effort, parrying others with his cane, all while dragging the action across numerous Parisian rooftops. Hawk Moth was confident. Maybe his akuma had been taken out of too soon, but he could still foresee this ending as he desired. The heroes were careful not to let him get close enough to take their miraculous himself, but as soon as Mayura’s sentimonster joined in, they were done for. 

But hubris, quite possibly, is Hawk Moth’s fatal flaw. Not just a pair of minutes after ditching the Arc, having wound up only a few blocks away on top of some department store, Ladybug’s yo-yo fastened around his cane in the same moment he was pulling it out of reach of her partner’s sizzling cataclysm.

“Now Chat!”

And then, before Hawk Moth could lunge for the kid and restrain his dangerous touch, Chat Noir’s hand plunged for the rooftop under their feet, and he launched himself right out of the danger zone with the help of his baton. Hawk Moth went board stiff as his foundation gave way, black jagged cracks widening to swallow him whole into the store waiting beneath. 

The fall lasted longer than he expected, and he doesn’t doubt that the landing could have killed him had he not been transformed. Amidst a spill of concrete breaking into the tile on the ground floor, Hawk Moth struggled to regain his breath, choking on billows of dust wafting up around him. The heroes’ voices fluttered down from above. He didn’t have much time to recover before they were on him, this time with the advantage of his weapon and not-falling-two-stories-onto-a-heap-of-concrete. 

Hawk Moth forced himself to his feet, heaving a chunk of rooftop off of his shin. He’d certainly have a killer bruise (or a few) in a matter of minutes if Ladybug’s power didn’t wipe them away first. Limping to the nearest clothing rack that hadn’t been either crushed like an empty soda can or showered in ten pounds of dust, Hawk Moth snatched an ugly green raincoat off a hanger and mumbled, “Dark wings fall.”

“Master –”

“Spare me, Nooroo,” he growled, brushing his face clean of dust and flipping the hood of his stolen coat up to conceal his head. 

Mercifully, the kwami shut up. 

At the front of the store, shoppers were evacuating, and Gabriel fell right in with them as he pushed through the doors into the summer sun, a summer sun so dry and hot that it was grossly suspicious that he was wearing a raincoat. But, to be fair, Gabriel Agreste being willingly out in public in such a location as a basic department store might have been a little bit _more_ suspicious, so he pulled the hood tighter around his face and kept his head down, hoping everyone was too concerned with making it to a safer location to question him. 

A woman screamed. He didn’t think much of it. Some people were hysterical during times like this. 

But in the following seconds, a few more voices joined hers. Gabriel finally glanced up when the world suddenly darkened, throwing his surroundings beneath a blanket of shade. Blocking the sunlight and swooping into the crowd from above was a bird – a great, hawk-like thing double the size of a car with brilliant indigo feathers ruffling against the air in its descent. Sharp pink eyes gleamed with menace and darted across the diverging throng of citizens. 

People had just cleared a space for its landing, pulling each other out of the way with terrorized shrieks, but Gabriel, at first, had forgotten himself. He’d forgotten that he should fear this thing just as much, that as long as his miraculous was concealed by an ascot, Hawk Moth nowhere to be witnessed, he had absolutely no reason not to look like he wasn’t fearing those outstretched talons would sink into his torso. 

He’d hesitated. And by the time it clicked that he should move or scream or _react_ , the sentimonster, not recognizing him in that garish green coat, released a guttural warble and knocked Gabriel right onto his ass in the middle of the street.

With two massive feet clawing at the asphalt on either side of his body, the sentimonster leaned towards him, its hooked beak inching closer and closer to his face; thus the decline of its head revealed the puppet-master sitting between its big blue unfolded wings, staring at him with utter bewilderment. 

And that’s how Gabriel Agreste wound up face-to-face with Mayura, surrounded by fifty unsuspecting Parisians, caught alive in one of the ugliest pieces of clothing he’s ever seen. 

Yes, this is most definitely not the plan. 

This is the furthest thing from the plan. 

Mayura blinks her wide magenta eyes at him, and her grip on the sentimonster’s neck feathers falters. She does not say his name. She does not say anything, but Gabriel can _read_ his name on her face, like she is shouting it on the inside, asking him how he could have allowed something like this to happen. 

And even though those last few minutes have just flashed before his eyes, Gabriel doesn’t think he’d be able to answer. He’s too amazed by her _posture_ of all things at the moment. As baffled and justifiably irritated she might currently be, she holds herself like she has riding experience. Maybe she does. Gabriel doesn’t know. She sits tall and straight, her shoulders broad, looking a bit like a knight despite the dress and the shiny black heels pinching the flank of her creation. She couldn’t seem more dignified if she had a sword hanging off her hip or pressed up to his throat. He pictures how she’d look with his rapier. Haloed by burning sunlight, Mayura is a brilliant blue flame. A flame that must want to kick his ass for his stupidity right now. 

The sentimonster bristles. Onlookers screech in horror that it seems like Gabriel’s about to have his head wrenched off his body by that intimidating beak. Gabriel doesn’t pay any mind to them. He just stares at Mayura. 

She holds his gaze, radiant and pissed off. Her cheeks flush a deeper shade of blue, and then she grabs her fan, cracking it open in front of her painted lips. 

“You need to work on acting scared,” she murmurs to him under her breath, voice taking on a soft, dangerous rasp that sends ice up his spine. “You look more like I’m going to take you out and less I’m going to _take you out_.” 

“W-what?”

“Act scared. Make it convincing. And plug your ears.” 

Gabriel scrambles to obey her as she drops the fan and snaps her fingers, compelling the sentimonster to let out a blood-curdling wail right into his face. 

“Hey!” 

A warning shout reaches them from above, and Gabriel and Mayura glance over just as a familiar spotted yo-yo wraps itself around the sentimonster’s beak to wrest it shut. 

“Get away from him!”

The sentimonster shakes its head. Mayura turns towards the heroes racing at her from the rooftops.

Before she takes off to meet them in midair, she peers swiftly back to Gabriel.

“Ditch the coat,” she tells him, the hint of a smile on her lips. Gabriel doesn’t know why, but his heart flutters. “Green isn’t your color, Sir,” 

The sentimonster launches towards Ladybug and Chat Noir. Gabriel watches them clash for a few moments, hands burning on the hot asphalt, heart pumping wildly. When these mysterious feelings finally melt out of him, he peels the revolting raincoat off and leaves it in the middle of the road. He heads home. 

That _really_ was not the plan. 

For some reason, though, he isn’t mad about it. Not even a little.

**Author's Note:**

> For the hilarious and lovely Starry_Sky12. Hope you enjoyed it, dear! 
> 
> Thanks for reading. Leave a comment, if you please. Have a fantastic day!


End file.
